


please reveal if what you are is real

by helsinkibaby



Category: The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: Age Difference, Alternate Universe - Strictly Come Dancing, Angst, F/M, Friendship, Het, Rare Pair, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-27
Updated: 2016-11-27
Packaged: 2018-09-02 15:51:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,009
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8673283
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/helsinkibaby/pseuds/helsinkibaby
Summary: Cisco arrives at Caitlin's apartment early on Sunday morning with the newspapers, ice cream and a box of tissues. Turns out the tabloids are wrong... except for they're not really.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [dance you into the dawn](https://archiveofourown.org/works/8282906) by [helsinkibaby](https://archiveofourown.org/users/helsinkibaby/pseuds/helsinkibaby). 



> So a couple of months ago, someone on comment_fic put up an "any, any, Strictly Come Dancing AU" prompt and since I'm a superfan who's looked at the show for years and knows exactly what I'd dance to if I was ever on the show, that prompt was right up my alley. Cue 30k words of The Flash Joe/Caitlin fic that achieved the rare feat of making me happy. When I got the prompts for the weekend challenge, they fit in nicely with a scene I knew all about but couldn't fit into that fic because that was all from Joe's POV and this scene needed to be from Caitlin's. 
> 
> The prompts were :   
> Random prompts weekend challenge -   
> 28 - Dust  
> 315 - It's About Time  
> 412 - Pretend  
> 621 - Wonderful World

Not for the first time this morning, Caitlin sniffs loudly as she tries to keep back a fresh wave of sobs that seems to come out of nowhere. She swats at her eyes impatiently and as if by magic, a box of tissues appears out of the corner of her eyes. She smiles a wan smile and turns to Cisco, her dance partner, best friend, in case of emergency contact who's definitely more than earned his money today, and gratefully pulls one from the box, dabbing her eyes and blowing her nose loudly. 

"More ice cream?" he asks her and she considers it for a moment before shaking her head. They've - well, she has - already made a sizeable dent in the first of the two tubs he'd brought over with him when he'd used his key to let himself into her apartment this morning, when he'd also brought along a box of tissues and a set of Sunday tabloid newspapers that had made her want to either throw up or faint or both. 

Not that she's entirely surprised by what they claimed, even if the way they claimed it rocked her to her core. She knows there's been Internet chatter and backstage chatter about her relationship with Joe - it's Strictly after all, there's always chatter about who hates who and who's fighting with who and who's sleeping with who. Especially the last one, which is the category they fall in to. There's been speculation about their closeness for a while now, she knows, and the situation the week before, where she'd hurt her ankle and he'd been so publicly supportive had exacerbated the situation, to say nothing of his slip of the tongue when she'd actually injured herself. Still, there's a world of difference between that and her looking at her own picture on the front page of a Sunday newspaper, one where her arms were wrapped around her dead fiancé, the headline Strictly Caitlin's Secret Heartbreak in large bold letters above it. Inset, there's a picture of her and Joe taken mid rumba which, of course, looks raunchy and romantic all at once, chosen especially to give the illusion of romance. 

She'd read every line of every article in every newspaper and when she'd finished, there was a pile of used tissues beside her and Cisco was holding out a bowl of ice cream, the first of many. She'd like another bowl now actually; only the thought of having to fit into her dance clothes tomorrow stops her. "Maybe later," she says and Cisco tilts his head, looks down at her phone which has finally stopped buzzing. 

"You should call him." 

The last word makes her stomach turn again and she drops her head into her hands. "I don't know what to say," she whispers, feeling tears fill her eyes again. "I mean, what do you say to someone when there's lies like this all over the papers?" 

Cisco narrows his eyes. "Lies?" There's a world of questions in that one word and Caitlin lifts her head to stare at him. 

"Cisco-" she begins but he cuts her off with a little smile. 

"Caitlin, we've been partners since we were kids," he reminds her. His hand is warm when it covers hers, his grip firm and familiar and she's reminded of how many times in her life he's been there for her, her rock, her constant. "And you know, I've got your back. Like, one thousand million percent. You want me to tell people that those red eyes are just a really gnarly dust allergy and you've run out of antihistamines, then fine, that's what I'll do. But you don't have to pretend with me. Ever." 

His obvious sincerity brings those tears her to the fore and she swipes at them impatiently. She hates crying, hates showing weakness in any form. Up until a few weeks ago, she hadn't cried since Ronnie died, had locked all her feelings, all her emotions behind a wall of ice - not for nothing had the Internet christened her the Snow Queen. This season though, especially in the last couple of weeks, it seems like she's shedding five years worth of tears all at once. 

Still though, that doesn't change the fact that the newspaper articles are full of lies. "Nothing's happened between us, Cisco," she tells him and she means it. Despite what was published in the red tops that morning, despite what internet commentators are writing, the only moment that might be interpreted as vaguely romantic had happened in the practice room the day that she'd told him what song had been chosen for them for their rumba. Even then, it had only been him covering his hand with hers, leaving it resting there as they stared into each other's eyes for a long moment. 

Which, OK, fine, had pretty much been the high point of her romantic life for the last five years, but still. 

The rest of the stuff that had been written about? Him carrying her to the hospital when she was injured, her tears and his obvious concern on It Takes Two? His using the endearment "Sweetheart" when he'd seen the state of her swollen ankle? The pictures of them coming to and from rehearsal, smiling at one another, oblivious of the paparazzi and their long lenses? It's all completely explainable within context. As are even the moments the general public haven't seen. The way his eyes sometimes linger on her on performance nights? He's so used to seeing her in ratty sweats and a ponytail that full makeup and ballgowns are a complete shock to him. Especially when it's not a ballgown but a Latin outfit, where the wardrobe department aren't known for being generous with the material. Him holding her on this very couch as she sobbed in his arms the day she was injured? They're a team, she was devastated because she couldn't face that weekend, he felt guilty, nothing more to it. 

Except if the way Cisco is looking at her is any indication, he doesn't believe her in the slightest. "Really?" There's a tiny grin hovering around the edges of his lips, soft disbelief in his voice. "That's what you're going with? Because I've seen the way he looks at you..." 

She shakes her head, wipes under her eyes with the pads of her fingers, holds her hands on her cheeks. "It's the Strictly bubble," she tells him. "You know what it's like... You spend so much time with each other that you see things that aren't there..." Her voice trails off as Cisco's head moves from side to side, his long hair swishing along his shoulders. 

"That's not what this is, Caitlin," he says and his hand tightens on hers. "Not for Joe. And definitely not for you." 

She wants to deny it but she can't. Not when she knows she's been nursing something of a crush on Joe pretty much since they've been paired up together, definitely since they started practising together, spending hours each day with one another, laughing and talking and dancing and basically having the time of her life. She'd known she was really in trouble on week two, in a draughty Television Centre corridor where she'd found him convinced he'd forgotten all the steps to their Cha-Cha. She'd taken his hand, told him to sing the music like he'd done so much in rehearsal (and she'd told him off for it all week, even if she secretly enjoyed it) and as they'd moved through the steps, between the dancing and his voice in her ear, goosebumps had erupted up and down her arms. He hadn't noticed, or if he had, he hadn't said anything about it, but her skin had tingled every time he touched her and she'd told herself it was just the dance, the moment, the Strictly experience. 

She hadn't fooled herself for a minute, not really, not deep in her heart. 

"You know what it's like for the celebrities," she tells him. "They're not used to spending all that time so close to someone, the way we dance-"

Cisco actually snorts. "Caitlin, if that was true, we'd have a different fling every year. Even you last year, with Mr Don't-You-Know-Who-I-Am." Which was a point Caitlin had to concede : it was the truth, even if the mere thought of anything romantic happening between her and her partner of the previous year made her stomach churn. He'd been a boyband member from a reality tv show who possessed more attitude and ego than dancing talent and who'd had a rabid cohort of fans who had voted to keep him in long past the point of ability, long past the point of Caitlin's patience with him. She'd never shown any of that though, not in interviews, not backstage, because it was Strictly and there was always chatter and it only took one unguarded comment to spread and set the Internet alight. She'd held her tongue, made out it was all sunshine and rainbows and only with Cisco, who she trusted implicitly, had she let her true feelings show. 

"You and Joe," he continues, "are not a showmance. I know you, Caitlin. I know that's not how you work." She opens her mouth to point out that he doesn't know Joe but he forestalls her by holding up one hand. "And before you say anything... I repeat - you should see how Joe looks at you." 

He's reaching for his phone, begins scrolling through the photographs and Caitlin thinks she knows where this is going. "Is this about the Blackpool picture?" The one he'd snapped of them on the bus on the way back, of her sound asleep on Joe's shoulder, Joe looking down at the camera and pointing at her with a bemused expression on his face. Cisco loved that picture, had threatened to get it put on Team JoeLin t-shirts to show his support if they made it to the final. 

To her surprise though, he shakes his head. "No," he says and his voice is as soft as his smile. "The one before it." 

He hands over his phone without any further commentary and Caitlin takes it, a smile coming unbidden to her face as she sees the picture. It's not unlike the one she was thinking of, was obviously taken on the same day, on the same journey. But in this picture, not only is she asleep, but Joe is too. His head is resting on top of hers and one of his arms is thrown out, resting gently over her knees. He looks contented somehow, peaceful, and there's an aura of intimacy around the two of them that's not in the other picture, not with the face Joe's making there. 

She finds herself swallowing hard against a lump in her throat, one that this time comes from happiness, rather than tears. "That's a great picture." 

"I haven't shown it to anyone else." She blinks, surprised at that, and he shrugs. "You know there's been talk... I just didn't want to add to it. Not when even I didn't know what was going on." 

"Nothing is, Cisco," she says because it's true but even she has to admit that his next word is also true. 

"Yet." 

She shakes her head again as she hands his phone back. "I don't know..." Her voice breaks and she huffs out an impatient breath. "What if you're wrong? What if it is the Strictly effect on him and..." She feels ill even thinking about how some of the past relationships on the show have ended and applying that to her and Joe. She'd rather have his friendship and nothing else than lose him altogether and she knows, if things went wrong, that that's what would happen. For just a moment, it's five years ago and she's standing in a cold dance studio receiving the worst phone call of her life. Then, as now, Cisco was at her side and maybe he knows what she's thinking because he looks stricken. 

"Caitlin, look, I know how devastated you were to lose Ronnie, OK? More than anyone, I know that. But he wouldn't want you to be alone for the rest of your life... and it's been five years." He pauses, licks his lips the way he does when he's about to say something he thinks she might not like. "Honestly? It's about time you fell for someone. And Joe's good people, and you guys have mad chemistry... I saw it on your first dance." 

She rolls her eyes at that, just like she had when she'd first been told the music they were going to dance to, the song with the same name as Joe's daughter. "Our first dance was a waltz, Cisco," she reminds him. "If I can't make a waltz look romantic, I'm not doing my job." 

But Cisco shakes his head, that funny little smile back playing around his lips. "No, Caitlin... your first dance." 

Caitlin feels herself frown, not understanding and Cisco chuckles almost to himself, calls up the YouTube app on his phone with one hand, reaching for the remote control of her television set with the other. He'd insisted she buy this model, had shown her how to cast the app from her phone onto the tv screen and though she hadn't seen the need at first, she will admit it's useful for looking back at their dances. She watches with interest the video he's selected and her breath catches in her throat as she realises what it is. 

Last year's Strictly, the first week after she and her partner had been voted out. A week she'd spent practically giddy with a sense of freedom of not having to train with someone she just didn't like. A week of pro rehearsals for that week's group dance and for the special musical performer, Joe West. 

He'd performed on the show before but this was the first time Caitlin had been involved in the number, her and Cisco and two other couples. She remembers the fun they'd had in rehearsals, just the six of them, dancing to a recording of Joe's voice, but the fun had more than doubled on the Friday when they actually met Joe and rehearsed with him. They'd choreographed a sequence where he stepped out from behind his mic stand, danced a little with each woman and Caitlin's had been the last and, by dint of the way the music went, the longest. (Not that any of the other dancers had mentioned that. Much.) Cisco lets the recording play from the start and Caitlin knows she's smiling as the notes of "Wonderful World," sung in Joe's now familiar voice fill her tiny living room. He holds the crowd in the palm of his hand as he performs, or at least he does until a wave of applause signals the dancers taking the floor and she can't help but notice that he doesn't do what some of the singers do, which is ignore the dancers completely, or worse, make it obvious that they wish they weren't there. No, Joe grins as he sings, doesn't take his eyes off the dancers as they move around, appreciation written all over his face. His grin grows even wider as he gets pulled out onto dance floor and by the time he's dancing with Caitlin, he looks like he's having the time of his life. As he spins her around - leading her even then, she notices - she sees the smile on her own face, wider than even when she dances with Cisco, like she's enjoying herself too. It's not her standard dancing smile, put it that way, and as she's digesting that fact, Cisco hits pause and the image of her and Joe grinning at each other like idiots, fills the screen. 

"I remember thinking at the time that I hadn't seen you smile like that since Ronnie." Cisco's voice is quiet and serious beside her and when she manages to tear her eyes from the television screen to look at him, she realises that he still hasn't looked away. "When I heard Joe was one of the celebrities, I knew they'd match him with you... I knew you'd be sensational together. And I was right." He turns his head towards her then, smiles a bright smile, even if his eyes are still serious. "What you two have, Caitlin, it's real. Please, please, don't let your fear or the tabloids or any of the Strictly bullshit make you think it's not. Please." 

Tears are once again rolling down Caitlin's face and she doesn't resist as he pulls her into a hug. 

Cisco stays there with her for most of the day until she starts feeling guilty that she's ruining his day off with her pity party. She sends him home with an order to do something fun and nice; he texts her a few minutes after leaving to let her know that there are paparazzi set up across the street so she shouldn't plan any, quote "nocturnal visitors" unquote. Not that that was ever going to be an issue but the way he worded it makes her laugh all the same. 

She puts the dishes in the sink, refuses to think about eating more ice cream and makes herself a nice comforting cup of tea instead, fairly sure that if Cisco were still here, he'd tease her about being frightfully British in a fake British accent that would make her laugh. As she curls up on the couch and sips, she thinks about everything else he said today, about Ronnie, about her, about Joe and before she knows it, she's reaching for her phone. 

She doesn't call him though. Instead, like Cisco did earlier, she punches up the YouTube app and searches, finds the official BBC playlists for the series and goes to Week 10, finds the recording of their rumba. Just like Cisco did, she casts it onto her television screen, all the better to see it, but this time, she's not looking for foot placement and errant thumbs. 

This time, she switches off her dancer's brain, her choreographer's brain, and she just watches the dance. Watches the story. Watches them. 

Watches Joe and the way he looks at her and for the first time, she sees what the Internet people have been screaming about. There's a tenderness there, to be sure, but there's passion there too and, at the end of the dance when he cups her face in his hands and their foreheads are touching, everything she feels is written all over her face, mirrored in his. 

That's good for another round of tears and when she pulls herself together, she closes down the app and calls Joe. 

He answers quickly, like he was waiting for her. "Hey," he says and she closes her eyes at the sound of his voice, feeling instantly better just for hearing him. Man, she's glad Cisco isn't here to see that; he already knows she has it bad, there's no point giving him further proof. "Are you ok?" 

There's only one answer to that. "No."

It might have been the only answer but it only serves to make him more concerned. "Are you alone? You want me to come over?"

She would love for him to come over. She wants to hug him, because a Joe West hug is one of the best things she's ever experienced. She wants him to wrap her in his arms, bury her head in the crook of his neck and stay like that forever. She wants to see his face, hear his voice when he's sitting beside her, not through a cell phone line. And no, she's not going to take this call to FaceTime. She's still in her pyjamas and she's been crying for most of the day. She still has some dignity. Just about.

"I don't think that's a good idea," she says quietly and she explains about Cisco and the photographers outside and in his little "Ah," of reaction, she knows that he understands. 

Except that's when something strange happens. He apologises to her, like this is all his fault, when it's her face, her past, that has them on the front pages, has people speculating about the most intimate parts of their lives. She tries to take the blame, and that's when he proves that he understands, tells her all about how the tabloids had published the story of the wife who had left him, the son he'd never known about, the distant relationship they still have. There was no mention of that in today's papers, so Caitlin draws the only conclusion she can. "So what you're telling me is that there's still another angle for the press to exploit?" 

Joe's answer comes with what she can only imagine is a wry smile. "I think that particular mine is all tapped out."

"I just don't want to make things worse for you," she tells him. 

"You couldn't-"

She doesn't let him finish. "Even if you're on the front pages of the tabloids because of me?" 

There's a long pause, or maybe it just seems that way to her. But when Joe speaks again, his voice is very, very serious, sending shivers up her spine. "It's not just because of you," he says and her heart skitters to a stop for a moment before lurching back to life, double time. "You know that, right?"

And there they are. 

Six little words that have the power to scare her to death and simultaneously make her want to jump for joy. 

"So I've been told," she hears herself say and when he asks, "Cisco?" she thinks back to all those hours this past week where Cisco had been helping them with their Argentine Tango and she wonders what the two of them talked about when she wasn't around. "He's good at reading people. Reading me," she tells him and she hears a little noise on the other end of the line that she hopes means she's confirmed that she does have feelings for him. They talk for another few minutes then, about Cisco, about the show, and when he says he doesn't regret a minute of it and she points out that he might tomorrow, his response is instant. 

"Never." Then, after a pause, quietly, gently, the words they've so often said to each other. "You and me, remember? Just like rehearsals." 

She sobs; she can't help it. "Stop making me cry," she tells him as she reaches for another tissue. "I'm so sick of crying." 

"You know I'm here, right?" he asks. "For whatever you need." 

"I know." And what she really needs is to see him, because this phone call, close as it is, is a poor substitute for the real thing. "I'll see you tomorrow?"

"Bright and early," he promises and there's a long moment where they stay on the line, neither talking, just sitting quietly, until he hangs up. 

She lowers her phone to her knees, blinks in surprise when she realises a message has come through from Cisco. She opens it and instantly, she smiles. "Thought you'd like a copy?" it says and underneath, there's the picture from the Blackpool bus, her and Joe sleeping soundly in one another's arms. She saves it quickly, types out a quick thank you before calling up the picture again, staring at it for a long, long time. 

She's still scared, she realises. But for the first time in a long time, fear is taking second place to hope. Fragile as she feels, she knows what a wonderful gift that is and she goes to bed that night with a smile on her face and dreams of dancing with Joe in her head. 

The glitterball trophy, funnily enough, doesn't feature in those dreams and when she wakes the next morning, she knows why. 

Because if what she and Joe have is real, then they've won without dancing a single step.


End file.
